Year 2745 – 1015 BCE – Solomon’s
alliance
with Pharaoh

After resolving
the succession feuds with his half-brother
Adonijah and his supporters, the kingdom became peaceful. It was time
for
Solomon to pursue peace outside as well:

And Solomon became allied to
Pharaoh king of Egypt by
marriage, and took Pharaoh's daughter, and brought her into the city of
David,
until he had made an end of building his own house, and the house of
the Lord,
and the wall of Jerusalem round about. Only the people
sacrificed in the
high places, because there was no house built for the name of the Lord
until
those days.--- I Kings 3:1-2Egypt
was then in what is called the Third Intermediate
Period, ranging from 1069 to 664 BCE. The previous powerful New
Kingdom had been weakened by internal struggles that led into the
effective division
of the country between political and religious powers: Lower Egypt in
the north with the political capital Tanis in
the Delta region was ruled by the Pharaoh, while Middle and Upper Egypt
in the
south with the religious capital Thebes was effectively ruled by the
High Priests
of Amon, linked to the royal family in Tanis.

Solomon
married a daughter of Pharaoh Psusennes I of the 21st
Dynasty,[1]
who reigned from
1047 to 1001 BCE.

Gold mask of
Psusennes I (Cairo Museum)

It was
important for kings of that dynasty to seek alliances and peace
on their
borders, so that they could maintain their power. To this effect and in
order
to seal his alliance with Solomon, he sent an expedition to secure the
border
between Egypt and the land of Israel, and destroyed Gezer,
the main enemy city on the common border:

Pharaoh King of Egypt had
gone up, and taken Gezer, and burnt
it with fire, and slain the Canaanites that dwelt in the city, and
given it for
a portion unto his daughter, Solomon's wife. And Solomon built Gezer,
and Beth-Horon
the nether, and
Baalath, and Tadmor in the wilderness, in the land, and
all the store-cities that Solomon had, and the cities for his chariots,
and the
cities for his horsemen, and that which Solomon desired to build for
his
pleasure in Jerusalem, and in Lebanon, and in all the land of his
dominion.--- I Kings 9:16-19

Concerning
the city of "Tadmor in the wilderness", it refers to the original city
that was later known as Palmyra. It is located well inside the Syrian
desert so fully justifies the description "in the wilderness". The name
Palmyra refers to palm trees, and in indeed derived from the name
Tadmor which originally as Tamar, which means palm tree. The
Biblical text (in Hebrew) actually cites both Tadmor and Tamar: וְאֶת-תמר (תַּדְמֹר) בַּמִּדְבָּר, בָּאָרֶץThe
location of Tadmor/Palmyra shows that the kingdom of Solomon streched
quite far north and east inside what was the land of Aram. The city is
also mentioned in the Talmud (late Roman period) as being a city that
had been destroyed but rebuilt again and became a city of depravity,
worse than Hell itself (Talmud, Yevamoth 17a).

In
1908, during excavations that took place in the ancient city of Gezer
during the Ottoman Empire, was found a milestone inscribed with writing symbols that give the annual seasons and
the calendar of months as follows:

Two months gathering [they correspond to the
start of the Hebrew year with the month of Tishri]

Two months planting

Two months late sowing

One month cutting flax

One month reaping barley

One month reaping and measuring grain

Two months pruning

One month summer fruit

--- Coogan, Michael D., "A Brief Introduction to
the Old Testament", page 119, Oxford University Press, 2009, cited in WikipediaThe
stone was dated from the 10th century BCE which would correspond to the
time of Solomon's reign, most probably after Pharaoh offered the city
to him.

The Gezer calendar (replica), Israel Museum
(the original is in the Istanbul Museum)

There are two important findings related to this inscription: the method of calendar and the writing itself.

About
the method of calendar, the practice of dividing the year into sets of
months (most sets being of two months) seems to have dated from the
settlement of the Israelites in Canaan. What is extraordinary is that
this method has remained in practice for about 1500 years as it is
described in the Talmud (which compiled in the 5th century CE):

[The second] half of Tishri, Marcheshvan, and the first half of Kislev is seed-time;[the second] half of Kislev, Tebeth, and half Shebat are the winter months; [the second] half of Shebat, Adar, and [the first] half of Nisan, cold months; [the second] half of Nisan, Iyar, and [the first] half of Sivan is the period of harvests; [the second] half of Sivan, Tammuz, and the first half of Ab are summer; the second half of Ab, Ellul and the first half of Tishri, hot months. Rabbi Judah counted [these periods] from [the beginning of] Tishri; Rabbi Simeon, from Marcheshvan.--- Talmud, Baba Metzia 106bConcerning
the writing on the inscription, it is based on an alphabet, not
pictograms. This is one of the earliest form of alphabet, and it dates
from the establishment of the Israelites in Canaan. Scientists call it paleo-Hebrew
alphabet, or "Canaanite" alphabet (which is misguiding because the
Canaanites themselves used the cuneiform writing as testified by the
Amarna letters to Pharaoh Akhenaten). So it is possible to imagine that the inscription may have been used by the people of Gezer (who were Canaanites) to learn
about the Hebrew calendar and alphabet of their new ruler (the Israelites).The
early Hebrew alphabet was extensively used in the time of King Solomon.
A second item has been discovered in Jerusalem by archaeologist Eilat
Mazar in July 2013 and the inscription was fully explained six months
later by Prof. Gershon Galil from the University of Haifa, Israel. The
artifact, an engraving on a clay jug, concerns the description of a
wine that was contained in the jug. The wine is described as lower
quality, bestowed by King Solomon for the use of people or guards
employed at his royal service. The wine was deemed to be no fit for the
king's table.

A more recent study, although being controversial, argues that the alphabet was actually already used by the Hebrews in Egypt.[9]

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Year
2745
– 1015 BCE – God grants wisdom
to Solomon

This marriage
was however more a political alliance than a
matrimonial union because the new wife remained in Egypt until, as the
Biclical text
says, Solomon had
made an end of building his
own house, and the house of the Lord, and the wall of Jerusalem round
about.
This will take him a few more years to complete. Meanwhile, the text
says: Solomon
loved the Lord (I Kings 3:3).
God appeared to Solomon in a dream and asked what he
desired:

"Give Your servant therefore
an understanding heart to
judge Your people, that I may discern between good and evil; for who is
able to
judge this Your great people?" And the speech pleased the Lord, that
Solomon
had asked this thing. And God said unto him: "Because you have
asked this
thing, and have not asked for yourself long life; neither have asked
riches for
yourself, nor have asked the life of your enemies; but have asked for
yourself
understanding to discern justice; behold, I have done according to your
word: lo, I have given you a wise and an understanding heart; so that
there has
been none like you before you, neither after you shall any arise like
unto you. And I
have also given you that which you have not asked, both riches and
honor, so
that there has not been any among the kings like unto you, all your
days. And
if you will walk in My ways, to keep My statutes and My commandments,
as your
father David did walk, then I will lengthen your days."--- I Kings 3:9-14And God extended the stretch
of Solomon kingdom from Egypt,
his ally, until the River, which is Mesopotamia. He ruled by a network
of
allies and provincial leaders.

There is
historical evidence of this occurrence in the records
of Babylon because, before the time of Solomon’s accession to power,
the
Arameans had made incursions to Babylon, toppled its leader,
Nabu-shum-Libur,
and ended his dynasty known as Dynasty V of Babylon. And then David
submitted
the Arameans to his rule:

David smote also Hadadezer
the son of Rehob, king of Zobah,[2]
as he went to establish his dominion at the river Euphrates. And
David took from him a thousand and seven hundred horsemen, and twenty
thousand
footmen; and David houghed all the chariot horses, but reserved of them
for a
hundred chariots.
And when the Arameans of Damascus came to succour Hadadezer king
of Zobah, David smote of the Arameans two and twenty thousand men. Then
David put garrisons in Aram of Damascus; and the Arameans became
servants to
David, and brought presents. And the Lor gave victory to David
whithersoever he
went. And
David took the shields of gold that were on the servants of Hadadezer,
and
brought them to Jerusalem. And from Betah and from Berothai, cities of
Hadadezer, King David took exceeding much brass.--- II
Samuel 8:3-8Most probably,
the gold and brass that David took away from
the Arameans had been previously taken by them from Babylon, as an
inscription
of Late Babylonian period stated:

During the reign of
Adad-apla-iddina, king of Babylon,
hostile Aramaeans and Suteans, enemies of the Ekur temple and the city
of
Nippur, […] plundered the land of Sumer and Akkad, and overthrew all
the
temples. The Aramaeans carried off the goods and property of the god
Enlil.--- Inscription of
Simbar-Sipak (or Simbar-Sihu), who reigned around 1025-1008
BCE [3]So, by the time
of Solomon’s reign, the Arameans, and by
extent the region of Babylon that they had previously conquered, was
under the indirect
dominance of the Israelites. The dynasty that followed Dynasty V of Babylon was
plagued with distress and famine, so that it never presented any threat
to
Solomon's kingdom during the time of his reign.

Solomon also
made alliance with the Phoenicians. Their king,
Hiram, had known King David and was married to an Israelite widow from
the
Tribe of Naphtali (I Kings 7:14).
This created bonds between the two royal houses, of Jerusalem and
Sidon.
Solomon traded with Hiram: he provided him every year wheat and oil,
and Hiram
provided to Solomon timber from the cedar trees of his land, today’s
Lebanon (I Kings 5:22-25).

Like their
allies the Phoenicians, Solomon had a navy that
carried Jewish tradesmen and adventurers over the seas:

For the king had at sea a
navy of Tarshish with the navy of
Hiram; once every three years came the navy of Tarshish, bringing gold,
and
silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks.--- I Kings 10:22The
mention of ivory means that the Jewish tradesmen reached Africa, where
elephants could be found. As of the peacocks, they originated from
India which is also a route taken by the maritime trade. But there is
more. A engraved stone was found in Tennessee in 1889, and it was
believed that the inscription on it was native Cherokee language, but
nobody had been able to translate it. Yet, for about 100 years, this
stone, which became known as the Bat Creek inscription, was considered as genuine.
But in 1988, a scientist discovered that the language on it was in fact
Paleo-Hebrew, the same language used in Judea in the time of King
Solomon ! A lot of energy had been spent since to prove the stone was
(suddenly) a forgery, although carbon dating test proved it to be quite
ancient in fact. A later attempt, in 2004, reported that the
inscription was a bad copy of a sentence found in a Masonic book
published in 1870, that echoed the words of Exodus 39:30, Holy to God (קֹדֶשׁ לַיהוָה).
Yet, the inscription is not really showing the same letter (a fact that
the proponents of this Masonic theory simply explained as a mistake
made by the copist who forged the stone !!). The inscription, in fact,
quite clearly states: the frontier of Judah
!! And indeed, if maritime travellers from Judah reached America in
these times (which somehow would explained the quantity of gold they
were able to bring back to King Solomon), that area would have been the
frontier of their farthest reach.

The Bat Creek inscription on top, and the Masonic inscription below

In
the above two texts, the letters in blue have been wrongly interpreted
by the Masonic proponents: while the Masonic text cleary shows a repeat
of the last letter, which is the letter Waw, that last letter is
totally different in the Bat Creek inscription which shows the letter
Dalet. Similarly, the second letter from the right is clearly the
letter Tsade in Paleo-Hebrew, and in the Masonic inscription that
letter is closed at the top making it the letter Dalet (like the last
letter -on the left- of the Bat Creek inscription). Finally the red
letter is the Masonic text, which is the letter Shin, is not found
in the Bat Yam inscription. In total, the Bat Yam inscription is
equivalent to the Hebrew words: קץ ליהוד, which means Frontier (or End) of Judah.

Paleo-Hebrew alphabet

This is also a period when, most
probably, some Israelites
settled around the Mediterranean Sea, on the shores of Asia Minor, in
Spain, in
Northern Africa, in what will later become the Maghreb, but also
probably
founded the city of Carthage along with the Phoenicians.

The Judgment of Solomon (Gustave Doré, 1868)

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The
Phoenicians obtain wisdom from Solomon

The
friendship between Solomon and Hiram benefited the
Phoenicians who learned about new concepts that were previously unknown
to most
people of the Antiquity. The only known Phoenician writer and historian
was
someone called Sanchoniatho (or Sanchuniathon). Although his works have
been
lost, some fragments have survived and have been referred to by
following
historians. From these fragments, we can detect the influence of
Biblical sources. For example, about cosmology, Sanchoniatho wrote:

He
supposed that the beginning of all things was a dark and
condensed windy air, or a breeze of thick air and a chaos turbid and
black as Erebus,
and that these were unbounded, and for a long series of ages destitute
of form.
But when this wind became enamoured of its own first principles (the
Chaos),
and an intimate union took place, that connexion was called
Pothos: and it was the
beginning of the creation of all things. And it (the
Chaos) knew not its own production; but from
its embrace with the wind was generated Môt; which some call Ilus
(Mud), but
others the putrefaction of a watery mixture. And from this sprung all
the seed
of the creation, and the generation of the universe. And there were
certain
animals without sensation, from which intelligent animals were
produced, and
these were called Zophasemin, that is, the overseers of the heavens;
and they
were formed in the shape of an egg: and from Môt shone forth the sun,
and the
moon, the less and the greater stars.
And
when the air began to send forth light, by its fiery influence on the
sea and
earth, winds were produced, and clouds, and very great defluxions and
torrents
of the heavenly waters. And when they were thus separated, and carried
out of
their proper places by the heat of the sun, and all met again in the
air, and
were dashed against each other, thunder and lightnings were the result:
and at
the sound of the thunder, the before-mentioned intelligent animals were
aroused, and startled by the noise, and moved upon the earth and in the
sea,
male and female.These
things were found written in the Cosmogony of Taautus, and in his
commentaries,
and were drawn from his observations and the natural signs which by his
penetration he perceived and discovered, and with which he has
enlightened us.---
Cory,
Isaac Preston, Ancient Fragments, London, 1832A
key element of this transmission of knowledge from the Israelites to
the Phoenicians was the alphabet. There is archaeological evidence that
the alphabet came to the Phoenicians during the reign of Hiram, because
the earliest alphabetical Phoenician inscription was found on the
sarcophagus of Hiram himself. This sarcophagus was made by the son of
Hiram (or Ahiram) for his father.

Inscription on Hiram sarcophagus in the first Phoenician alphabet (Museum of Beirut)

The inscription reads:

THE
COFFIN WHICH (IT) TOBAAL, SON OF AHIRAM, KING OF BYBLOS [GEBAL], MADE
FOR HIS FATHER AS HIS AB(O)DE IN ETERNITY, AND IF ANY KING OR ANY
GOVERNOR OR ANY ARMY COMMANDER ATTACKS BYBLOS AND EXPOSES THIS COFFIN,
LET HIS JUDICIAL SCEPTER BE BROKEN, LET HIS ROYAL THROWN BE OVERTHROWN,
AND LET PEACE FLEE FROM BYBLOS; AND AS FOR HIM, LET A VAGABOND (?)
EFFACE HIS ENSCRIPTION (!)--- Source: press article from The Daily Beagle

Another
important knowledge of the time was the system of wind flows on Earth.
It was with Solomon's wisdom that the Phoenicians could understand that
the winds did not blow straight but with a circular effect. This was an
important point for maritime routes, to take advantage of one wind or
another. This is the reason they were called the "trade winds". This
knowledge was expressed in the Bible, in a book attributed to Solomon:

The
wind goes toward the south, and turns about unto the north; it turns
about continually in its circuit, and the wind returns again to its
circuits.--- Ecclesiastes 1:6

The winds flow in circles on Earth

Did the Phoenicians
become the greatest maritime nation of the times because they received
knowledge from Solomon about the nature of "trade winds" to make the
maritime routes more useable?

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The
Phoenicians pass wisdom to the Greeks

The new
knowledge that every form of life started from a watery
mixture
spread from Solomon to his friends the Phoenicians, and from the latter
to other civilisations among the Phoenician world which were harbour
cities. This concept surely pleased a maritime nation like them. It was
also adopted by Thales of the city of Miletus, in Asia Minor,
who is considered as the founder of Science and of Philosophy.[4]
Thales declared:

Water
constituted the principle of all things.---
Diogenes Laertius, Lives and opinions of eminent philosophers; it is a
biography of the philosophers written in about 300 CEBut
Thales was not the first Greek to believe that water was
the beginning of everything. Before him, Hesiod, who lived in year
about 700 BCE,
wrote a poem[5]
called Theogony
in which he related the traditions of his times that the
initial state of the universe was Chaos, a gaping void (abyss) and
total
darkness, from which Aether (the upper light) was brought by a divine
essence,
and then the primordial waters appeared:

Verily at the first Chaos
came to be, but next wide-bosomed
Earth, the ever-sure foundations of all […]. From Chaos came forth
Erebus[6]
and black Night; but of Night were born Aether and Day, whom she
conceived and
bare from union in love with Erebus. And Earth first bare starry
Heaven, equal
to her, to cover her on every side, and to be an ever-sure
abiding-place for
the blessed gods.---
Hesiod, Theogony,
translated by Hugh G. Evelyn-White, 1914, lines 116-138These
considerations about the origin of the universe are
reflected in various cultures, about in these same periods prior to 500
BCE, and
they probably were legends made from stories that have emerged from the
kingdom
of Solomon and that spread to other people and cultures in the form of
tales.The
cooperation with the Phoenicians also brought them the concept of
alphabet. Before their encounter with the Hebrews, the
Canaan people used cuneiform as evidenced by the letters of Amarna. And
a couple of hundred years later, they had switched to alphabet. How?
God gave
the Torah and its alphabet to the Hebrews after the Exodus, and it was
lately used by David and his son
Solomon who wrote poetry that would be included in the Jewish Bible,
for example the Psalms and the Song of Songs
Solomon explained the concept of letters to Hiram who then tought it to
his people
the Phoenicians. Before letters of alphabet, the ancient world only
used symbols, such as
cuneiforms or hieroglyphs. From the Phoenicians, the concept of
alphabet spread to the maritime cities they used or build. It
was
first transmitted to the Greeks who passed
it to the rest of Europe over time, through their culture. This fact is
confirmed
by Herodotus, the first world historian, who wrote the following in
about 400 BCE:

The
Phoenicians who came with Cadmus, and of whom the
Gephyreans were a part, introduced during their residence in Greece
various
articles of science, and amongst other things letters, with which, as I
conceive, the Greeks were before unacquainted.---
Herodotus,
The Histories, Book V – Terpsichore, section LVII
This opinion of Herodotus had
been widely accepted in the ancient times, at least until the early
Christian era. Cadmus, a Phoenician prince, established himself in
Greece probably around 1000 BCE (the Phoenicians created their alphabet
some years before) and brought the knowledge of alphabet with him which
was then passed into Greek culture:

Cadmus, the father of Semele,
came to Thebes in the time of Lynceus, and was the inventor of the
Greek letters.--- Clement of Alexandria, Stromata,
Book I, 21:141, to access this text online,click
hereOne
of the earliest archaeological proofs of the existence
of an alphabet among the Israelites is a seal that was found in Israel
and
dated about 700 BCE which bears the name of the city of Beth-Lehem.

The wisdom
that God gave to Solomon was disseminated to the ancient world by means
of stories and knowledge, over the years, and operated a turn in
mankind's understanding of nature and science, in many domains, and
intellectual investigations became possible with the help of alphabet.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Year
2745
– 1015 BCE – Solomon starts the
construction of the Temple
in Jerusalem

In the 4th year
of his reign, Solomon started to
build a Temple to host the Ark of Covenant. His father, King David,
envisioned
to carry out this project but was advised by Nathan the Prophet not to
do it in his times.

And it came to pass in the
four hundred and eightieth year
after the children of Israel were come out of the land of Egypt, in the
fourth
year of Solomon's reign over Israel, in the month Ziv, which is the
second
month, that he began to build the house of the Lord.--- I Kings 6:1 (usual
translation)The
480 years mentioned in this text has widely been assumed
to be 480 years from the Exodus, when the children of Israel
came
out of
Egypt. This is what the original Seder Olam Rabbah has considered. This is
what historians have considered and who based their calculations on the
various translations that were given in their language to this text.
But the interpretation of this text has been erroneous. Here
are
the words in Hebrew where the misinterpretation occurred:

לְצֵאת
בְּנֵי-יִשְׂרָאֵל

This text has been widely understood as the Exodus of the Bene-Israel. But it
is not so. When the Biblical text mentions the Exodus, the wording
typically implies that God took
out the Children of Israel from Egypt. The examples are:
- Exodus 12:51 הוֹצִיא יְהוָה אֶת-בְּנֵייִשְׂרָאֵל => God
brought the Children of Israel [out from the land of Egypt]
- Exodus 3:10וְהוֹצֵא
אֶת-עַמִּי בְנֵי-יִשְׂרָאֵל => bring
forth my people the Children of Israel [from Egypt]

The main
message is clear: it is God who brought
out the Bene-Israel from Egypt, who were thus
beneficiaries
of His action.

But what does
the above text says: it mentions that the Bene-Israel did the action
themselves, when they
came out
of Egypt. The difference is not easy to perceive in a simple
translation word like Exodus:
the actual Exodus refers to the Bene-Israel being taken out, while the
text above in I Kings 6:1 refers to the Bene-Israel going out
themselves. That is
the difference: the result
of taking out
(by the hand of God) vs. the action of going out (by
themselves).

So
did the Bene-Israel did go out of Egypt by themselves? Yes and there is
only one occurrence, if we understand the word Bene-Israel not as the
usually translated Chidlren
of Israel but instead as Children of Jacob,
because Jacob was called Israel. The
Children of Jacob did come out of Egypt by themselves, only once...
when they went to bury their father to the Cave of Machpelah, and then
they returned to Egypt as they had promised to Pharaoh. This was in Hebrew year 2265
(see Generation 19).

So
the understanding of I Kings 6:1 should have been that the come out of
Egypt was not the Exodus, but the funeral procession to bury Jacob in
Canaan:

And
it came to pass in the four hundred and eightieth year
after the children of Jacob
were come out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth
year of Solomon's reign over Israel, in the month Ziv, which is the
second
month, that he began to build the house of the Lord.---
I Kings 6:1 (revisited)And thus, 480
years from this unique event takes our chronology to 2265+480 = Hebrew
year 2745 (1015 BCE).

And
why King Solomon would have counted the years from the return of Jacob
to Canaan as opposed to the years from the Exodus? I can personally see
two good reasons. The first is that the return of Jacob remains to
Canaan is a symbol of the future return of his descendance: he was the
Patriarch to return and from him would be counted the return, at least
spiritual, of the children of Israel. The second reason may be more
pragmatic: Solomon had married Pharaoh's daughter. Would it be
politically correct to commemorate the new Temple with the counting of
years from the Exodus, the single event that caused the clash of the
ancestors of both Solomon and his father-in-law? Better was to count
from the return of Jacob to Canaan, at a time when both the Hebrews and
the Egyptians were living together peacefully.

Another
parallel may be drawn between the burial of Jacob and the death of his
wife Rachel. When the later died the text says: (Genesis 35:18) בְּצֵאת נַפְשָׁהּwhich
means that "her soul departed -voluntarily- from her". At the time, we
explained that this death was her redemption. And here again, with the
counting of the years for the Temple, the text says "when the
sons of Israel/Jacob departed -voluntarily- from Egypt". In other
words, their departure from Egypt to go and bury Jacob in Canaan was
the first stone to their Redemption, which will become full when God
will take them out from Egypt Himself. The fact that there were 480
years between the return of Jacob to Canaan and the First Temple is
also in parallel of the 480 years that will be between the death of
Rachel and the time when the Israelites lost the Ark of the Covenant at
the time of the Judges (see death of Eli the High Priest).

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Year 2745
– 1015 BCE – The value of Pi

Mathematicians
of the Antiquity
had long ago understood that the circle had special properties in terms
of proportions. They had estimated the circumference of a circle to be
about 3 times its diameter. This simple ratio or equivalent ones were used in Mesopotamia and in
Egypt. But it took longer time to realise that the ratio of the area
was actually proportional to the square of its diameter: this was first
formulated by the Greek mathematician Euclid (who lived in
Alexandria at the time, around 300 BCE) as follows:

Circles are to one another as
the squares on their diameters.--- Euclid, Elements, book
XII, proposition 2 (to read it on line, click here)It means that
the proportion
between two circles is calculated as the proportion between the square
of their diameters, and this proportion or ratio is a constant. Nobody
knows for certain how Euclid came to this proposition but it is
generally assumed he had learned it from another mathematician called
Eudoxus of Cnidus, a disciple of Plato, who specialised himself in the
calculation of proportions and was a known source for some of Euclid's
propositions. This Eudoxus lived one generation before
Euclid as he died around 350 BCE. The famous proportion was
named as Pi (π) many centuries
later, in 1706, and its value is about 3.14.

Geometry of the
square and the circle

But
little is known that, at the time of Solomon, this proposition
was
already known. The Talmud contains a discussion about the proportions
used by the king to make the "Molten Sea" (also called the "Brazen
Sea"), a large basin used in the Temple for the purification of the
priests. To start with, here are the dimension of this molten sea:

And
he made the molten sea of ten cubits from brim to brim, round in
compass, and the height thereof was five cubits; and a line of thirty
cubits did compass it round about.---
I Kings 7:23If
the diameter was 10 cubits, the circumference would have been over 30
cubits, so about 10x 3.14 = 31.4 cubits. The apparent discrepancy is
explained in the text itself which says 10 cubits from brim to brim:
this means the brim of the recipient was slightly larger than the
actual recipient. The brim itself was the size of the brim of a cup as
the following Biblical text explained:

And
it was a handbreadth thick, and the brim thereof was wrought like the
brim of a cup, like the flower of a lily: it received and held three
thousand baths. ---
II Chronicles 4:5So,
if we take the circumference of 30 cubits of the Molten Sea, it
corresponds to a diameter of about 30 / 3.14 = 9.55 cubits. Because the
diameter brim to brim was 10 cubits, the brim was half the difference
of 10 - 9.55 = 0.45 cubits. The brim was therefore roughly 0.22 cubits,
which is
about 10 centimetres, roughly a handbreadth
thick. So the Biblical measurements indeed make sense.

Many artists have tried, with
not much success, to render the Molten Sea, as shown in the diagram
below:

But
it was not rounded at the base, as it is often depicted. It
was
square at its base and round above it. This calculation was made
according to the number of ritual
baths it contained,[7]
and implied a knowledge of the ratio between a circle and a square of
the side being the diameter in order to get the size of the Molten Sea
correct:

But
consider: By how much does [the area of] a square exceed that of a
circle? By a quarter. Then of the four hundred [cubic cubits previously
assumed] one hundred [must be deducted], and of the hundred [cubic
cubits] twenty-five [must be deducted]. [Would not then the number of
ritual baths] be only a hundred and twenty-five? — Rami b. Ezekiel
learned that the sea that Solomon made was square in its lower three
cubits and round in its upper three.---
Talmud, Eiruvin, 14bA
circle of diameter 2R (R being the radius) is about a quarter less in
proportion than the square that has side of 2R. Indeed:

-
the area of the square is 2R x 2R = 4R2, and the
area of the circle is πR2; the ratio between the two
shapes is 4/π- the
circumference of the square if 4x 2R= 8R, and of the circle is 2πR; here again the ratio
between the two shapes is 8/2π = 4/π

So,
where we look at the ratio of the circumferences or of the areas, the
square is in excess of 4/π compared to the circle,
which is close to the Talmudic estimate of a quarter (the
error to 4/π
is only of 7%).

This
proportion of estimated 25% between square and circle, used by Solomon
to order the making of the Molten Sea, was only mentioned in writing by
Euclid, who may have learned it from Eudoxus, some 650 years after the
Temple of Solomon.

The
Biblical text seems to give us further hint in the approximation of
this mysterious
ratio (Pi) because of the comparaison of the two only texts in the
Bible where the dimensions of the Molten Sea was given: in I Kings 7:23
the word "line" is (incorrectly, but purposedly) written קוהwhile in II Chronicles it is
written קו.
What is the difference? In the former reference the letter 'Heh (ה) has been
added to the word (!, and this changes the value of this word. The
value
(gematria) of קוה is 100+6+5= 111, while the
value of the normal word קו is 100+6= 106.
If we take the ratio of these two writings for the word "line", and
multiply it by the ratio mentioned in the Bible between the line and
the circumference, we get 3 * (111/106) = 3.1415 which is the number
Pi correct at four decimals (error ratio of 0.0026% only) ! To appreciate this point, we have
to remember that the calculation for the Temple was done by the
Israelites in 1015 BCE while the exact value of Pi only became known to
four decimals to European mathematicians over 2000 years later with a
polygon approximation method (Fibonacci estimated the value of 3.1418
in year 1220 CE). This distortion of the word קו into קוה
in this passage of I Kings seems as if the writer wanted to stress
specifically here that, regarding this measurement of circle,
there was a value hidden to human knowledge at the time. But the Bible
is not a builders' guidebook, and there
are not so many "construction works" described in it.

The Rabbis, for
the purpose of their religious guidance, contended themselves to use
the value of 3 for this unknown ratio between circumference of a circle
and its diameter. As it is said multiple times over the
Talmud, [for example in Baba Metzia, 31b] The Torah employs human
phraseology. In their times, the approximation
of 3 (or a bit higher than 3) was good enough for human scale
purposes. For example, as the Talmud deals with relations and
contracts between individuals, it is better to use a lower
approximation of an unknown number than using a high approximation
because in the latter case buyers would be over-charged in their
transactions. If one would need to buy a fence for his rounded shape
property, using 3 as an approximation would mean that the buyer would
buy 5% less for the fence. But then, he can still add more when he
realises 5% of the fence (the circumference) are still missing.
Whereas, if the value of Pi would have been assumed by the
Talmud to be 3.16, then the buyer would pay 1% more than necessary. The
Talmud protects the buyer (the customer) ! In fact another text proves
that the Sages were fully aware of the approximation being used was 3
and 1/7 but refrained from using it because of its impracticality for
their human scale purposes:

Nehemiah says, since the
people of the world say that the circumference of a circle contains
three times and a seventh of the diameter, take off from that
one-seventh for the thickness of the sea on the two brims, then there
remain thirty cubits [that compass it round about].--- Mishnat ha-Middot: this
book written about 150 CE is said to have contained the teachings of an
older book of mathematics, now lost, called the Forty-Nine Rules and
attributed to a tanna called Rabbi Nathan (author of the Avot of Rabbi
Nathan)To
complete this discourse on the number Pi, it is also worth noting that
it has been considered an irrational number (which means a number that
can never be expressed as a ratio or fraction) in a mathematician
called Lambert in the... 18th century ! Yet, the Middle-Age Jewish
commentator Maimonides had already stated that both Pi and the square
root of 2 had this property:

The
side of a square having an area 5000 square cubits cannot be found ; in
the same way as the true value of the relation between the
circumference and the diameter of a circle cannot be found ; this is
not due to our ignorance but to the peculiar character of the
calculation.--- Feldman W.M., Rabbinical Mathematics and Astronomy, p. 59

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Year
2752– 1008 BCE – Solomon completes
the construction of the Temple

The
construction of the Temple took 7 years (I Kings 6:37-38).
It happened during the 55th Jubilee since the Creation (55 x 50 years = Hebrew year 2750).

God promised to Solomon that He would dwell in the Temple as long as he will follow His
statutes
and commandments.

The Holy of Holies was a perfect cube of dimensions 20 x 20
x 20 cubits. Two cherubim were placed in it, 10 cubits of width each,
with
their two wings spread wall to wall and touching each other, so all the
width
of the place was used.
In between the two cherubim, lower than the wings that touched one
another, the
Ark was placed: it measured 2.5 x 1.5 1.5 cubits, and two small
cherubim
covered it (Exodus 25).

An
artifact so-called the "ivory pomegranate" (although it is not made of
ivory but of bone from an hippopotamus), came to light in the
collectors market in 1979. It contains a writing in paleo-Hebrew that
states: Holy to the Priest of the House of God
(tetagram name). A leading Israeli curator stated that theartifact was
genuine and the State of Israel acquired it for a large sum. Why is it
important? Because it is the only artifact dating from the time of
Solomon and related to a priesthood service in the House of God.
In other words, this artifact proes that there was indeed a temple
built by Solomon, although archaeology could not find a proof of it
simply because the temple was destroyed and rebuilt over a long period
of time. Following this acquisition by the Museum of Israel, experts
were divided between genuineness and forgery. A court case was brought
against the arts dealer who sold it, but the court concluded there was
no evidence of forgery. If you believe the artifact is genuine, then it
is one of the most important find to prove that Solomon indeed built a
temple.

Famous or infamous? The "ivory" pomegranate

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Year
2752– 1008 BCE – The 24 hours day

Since the Israelites came to
Canaan, they progressively lost the souvenir of the practice of
calendar and times during the chaotic period of the Judges, each Tribe applying their own rules. But, with
the completion of the Temple, the divine service had to be established again for all the people. And
Solomon fixed the course of the "day" by a division in 24 hours. Why?
He set a priestly "watch" service in the Temple, with 24 of them per
day (daytime and night included). This is contained in the verses of
his prayers and supplications to God when he introduced the Ark in the
Holy of Holies. The text of the Bible for this set of prayers is contained in the
verses from I Kings 8:23 to I Kings 8:53 where 24 times Solomon used
the words pray (or prayer) and supplication.[8a]
And he concluded his prayers by saying that they will be repeated day
and night, thus completing a day cycle by fractions of 24 equal parts:[8b]

And
may these words of mine, with which I have made supplication before the
Lord, be close to the Lord our God, day and night, that He sustain the
cause of His servant and the cause of His people Israel, each day's
need granted on its day.--- I Kings 8:59This way of the division of the day was not supposed to be restricted to the Jews only, as Solomon concluded as:

That all the peoples of the earth may know that the Lord, He is God; there is none else.--- I Kings 8:60Solomon
thus endeavoured to share this knowledge, surely acquired from the
Wisdom that God had granted to him, with the other "peoples of the
earth". The Phoenicians passed it to the Greeks, who carried it to
the world we know, including India which used a different system
of day
division until the Greeks came with the 24 hours system. Thus the
division became standard in the world from these times, from 1000 BCE
onwards.[8c]

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Notes:

[1]This dynasty is often called
“Tanite” because its capital was in Tanis

[4] Thales
is famous to mathematicians for the theorem named after him; as of the
philosophers, it was Aristotle himself who declared that Thales was the
founder
of the Philosophy

[5]In his times in Greece, every
writing was in the form of poem

[6] It is
the personification of Darkness in Greek mythology

[7] In Biblical measurements, a ritual bath was the
volume of water needed to immerse a full human body, equivalent to 40 se'ah; whereas a bath was simply the
quantity of 3 se'ah; the Molten Sea was said to
contain a volume of 2000 baths
[I Kings 7:26], equivalent to 6000 se'ah,
equivalent to 6000/40 = 150 ritual
baths;
the calculation that follows was to determine to shape of the Molten
Sea that contained 150 ritual baths and was round shape in its uper part

[8a] For more details, see Talmud, Berachot, 11b and 29a

[8b] In Jewish tradition, a "day" starts
from the sunset (determined by spotting of the first stars), until the next
occurrence the following "day"; the Muslims adopted this way as well

[8c] The Jewish tradition has also adopted a division of the hour in 1080 equal portions (chalakim), and each portion (chelek) consisting of 76 moments (regaim) instead of the now common sexagesimal system of 60 minutes and 60 seconds
which is purely arbitrary; for example, the synodic month (the time
between two full moons) was known to the Greeks as being of 29 days 12 hours 44 minutes and 3 1/3 seconds, whereas the Israelites have it as 29 days 2/3 hour and 73 chelakim; the Jewish division of time is related to astronomical phenomena: without getting into too many details, the chelakim is derived from the precessional year (a cycle of 25920 years= 24x1080) and the regaim from the metonic cycle (a cycle of 19 years, and 19x4= 76);
this is simply to show that the Jewish Sages were fully aware of
astronomical phenomena that, for some of them, only became clearly
expressed in the modern times